‘Hurt’ Nitish pans ‘biased’ Katju over media gag report

Chief minister Nitish Kumar on Wednesday lashed out at the Press Council of India chairman Markandey Katju and called the PCI's report on alleged press censorship in Bihar as 'biased'.

PATNA: Chief minister Nitish Kumar on Wednesday lashed out at the Press Council of India (PCI) chairman Markandey Katju and called the PCI's report on alleged press censorship in Bihar as 'biased'.

The CM was replying to the debate on the motion on governor's address in the state assembly. "I want to tell him that he has dialled a wrong number," he said at the conclusion of his 110-minute speech which was occasionally interrupted by leader of opposition Abdul Bari Siddiqui.

"I was deeply hurt when Katju, during a programme here, compared me with Dhananand of Nand dynasty. Who gave him this right to speak anything against me, unilaterally? If I am born in a very humble family and have no high-profile background, it does not mean that anybody can utter nonsense about me," Nitish said. Referring to Katju and his grandfather Kailashnath Katju's high-profile background, Nitish said, "I am not born with a silver spoon." The CM said Katju should at least respect the posts he held.

Asserting that he was not scared of his 'Bandar ghurki' (hollow threats), the CM said he was not in power at his mercy. "The people gave us mandate and it is the public and god's blessings that I am here and no other power can shake me," he fumed.

Continuing his tirade against Katju and the PCI's fact-finding team, the CM said the world knows who they are connected with and for whom they work. "It is ridiculous that the person who hurled charges on me constituted a committee and before its report was approved, it had been circulated through internet in a planned manner. What report one can expect from the people having a biased opinion," he alleged and claimed that he never asked any media house to publish or not publish any report.

The CM said he was reacting only because the opposition raised the issue in the house.

At the outset, the CM talked about the policies and programmes of his government and attacked the opposition, mainly RJD, for its misleading propaganda. On crime front, he quoted the National Crime Records Bureau figures saying Bihar stood 24th in cognizable offences, 22nd in crime against women, and 21st in crime against child abuse. On the other hand, Bihar is number one in the country in tackling corruption and third in making arrests in cognizable offences.

The CM said he has demolished the once flourishing industry of kidnapping for ransom in Bihar till 2004. Quoting the figures, he said in 2004, 3,861 cases of murder, 1,297 of dacoity, 2,909 of robbery and 411 of kidnapping for ransom were reported while in 2011, the number came down to 3566, 540, 1266 and 70, respectively. About the kidnappings in recent years, he said most of them were for different reasons like marriage (2,992), elopement (402) and others (1,031).